Google Merchant Center Warnings and Errors
Warnings and errors are common in Google Merchant Center. It is the reason why we built gmcfeed.com, to help correct your product data.
You can use the information below to help correct these issues. Still having an issue? Contact us in the chat and we'd be glad to assist.
[E] Errors: Prevent products from listing and will need to be investigated an corrected first.
[W] Warnings: Will still allow your products to be listed, however they are not the best quality so it would be wise to review and correct.
[I] Information: These are suggested optimizations from Google and will not harm your products.
Errors
- [E] Missing Shipping information
This error occurs due to incorrect setup of the Shipping information. Common causes can be missing weight information if you are utilizing calculated shipping.
Action: Refer to Googles documents on
Shipping Setup. After completing this, navigate to the feed within GMC and select fetch now.
Alternate Action: Calculated shipping requires a weight to be included in the feed. Update your data to contain a weight value.
It will need to be in the required format included the unit of measurement: "1 lb" .or "1 g"
- [E] Missing Tax information
This error occurs due to incorrect setup of the tax information.
Action: Refer to Googles documents on
Tax Setup. After completing this, navigate to the feed within GMC and select fetch now.
- [E] Wait up to 3 days for image crawl to complete
When new products are added, Google bots crawl your website to verify images.
Action: This error should resolve itself after 3-4 days.
- [E] Missing images
The product data does not contain image links.
Action:Please review your products data and correct accordingly.
- [E] Images too small
Google will requires images to be at least 250x250 pixels.
Action: Make sure your product is 250x250 pixels.
- [E] Website URL not claimed
Your website must be claimed and verified in order to be able to advertise your products.
Action: Refer to Google documents on Claiming your URL.
- [E] Invalid or missing required attribute: price
If the default currency is not set up, Google will not recognize the price and will return an error.
Action: Set the default currency.
- [E] Invalid or missing required attribute: sale price
If the default currency is not set up, Google will not recognize the price and will return an error.
Action: Set the default currency.
- [E] Automatic item disapprovals due to policy violation
This error occurs when one or more products are violating Google's advertising policy.
Action: It would be best to contact Google Support for help with this error.
- [E] Temporary item disapprovals due to incorrect prices
This error is due to the price in the feed not matching what is currently found on the website.
Action: Make sure the product URL and price of the individual SKU in the feed matches what is currently displayed on your website.
Alternate Action: Make sure the field 'item_group_id' is mapped to the parent SKU found in your data.
- [E] Product pages cannot be accessed from a mobile device
If Google cannot crawl the product page with a mobile-user agent, it will disapprove the product from showing on Google Shopping
for desktop and mobile devices.
Action: Contact Google Support to see if they can assist. You might need to then discuss this with your website developer.
- [E] Invalid or missing required attribute: color or size
For most products listed in the "Apparel" category a color and size is required.
Action: Review your product data. Add a color or size option to the gridview or your product data.
- [E] Items preemptively disapproved due to data quality violation (Data Quality: Promotional Text or Watermarks)
Google does not accept watermarks or promotional text on images.
Action: Correct product images so that no watermark element is displayed on image.
- [E] Insufficient product identifiers: Missing two out of three attributes [GTIN, brand, mpn]
For some products Google requires a brand field and a GTIN or MPN (SKU field in Shopify) to be set.
Action: Make sure each product has brand name set and add a barcode or SKU field to them as well.
Alternate Action: Set the field 'identifier_exists' to "False" there by making these "custom" products.
Warnings
- [W] Restricted usage GTIN
This warning is present because your products are missing the correct GTIN values (barcode) in your shop.
Action: Make sure your barcode/UPC/GTIN value is correct. Useful resource: barcode lookup
- [W] Missing recommended attribute: image link
Your products do not have images.
Action: Make sure that all of your products have images and add them where missing.
- [W] Missing recommended attribute: description
Your products do not have descriptions.
Action: Make sure that all of your products have descriptions and them where missing.
- [W] Low image quality
Google requires images of at least 250x250 pixels.
Action: Make sure you use a high quality first image of at least 250x250 pixels in size.
Information
- [I] Capitalized titles
Some of you items have titles that contain excessively capitalized text.
Action: Correct the titles of the products and modify the highly capitalized ones. ie. TOP SHELF > Top Shelf
- [I] Missing microdata for condition
Google is crawling your website and not detecting the value for condition.
Action: Your Website developer would need to correct the site to resolve. (This is a common error and can be ignored).
- [I] Automatic item updates: Missing schema.org microdata price information
Some of your items have landing pages with invalid price information in the microdata.
Action: Make sure the price metadata information is correct in schema.org.
- [I] Automatic item updates due to incorrect availability
Google found a mismatch between the product availability stated in the feed and the one stated on the website.
Action: You can check and correct the microdata from the website, or disable the automatic updates from your Google Merchant
account.
- [I] Short descriptions
Some of your items have short desscriptions.
Action: Use longer descriptions. They help users find products on Google Shopping. If you use short descriptions, users are less
likely to find your items when looking for a particular product.
- [I] Additional images too small
The product's image is too small to be used in an ad.
Action: Make sure the images meet Googles' image requirements.